We’re more than halfway through this summer’s Blue and Yellow Line shutdown, with all six stations south of National Airport slated to resume service on September 9. Alexandria put out a midsummer report about how the shutdown has impacted the city. Here are some of its findings:
It’s slowing down traffic in Alexandria
Alexandria installed 30 additional traffic monitors on some of its major corridors before the platform project began, and found that, so far, travel times in the city increased by about 4 percent in comparison to the spring. But the report notes that, in general, traffic is lighter in the summer months, so the increase in travel times might be higher when comparing to average summer conditions. The worst travel time increases were eastbound on Duke Street during the evening commute and northbound on Van Dorn Street during the morning commute.
More people are biking
The Potomac Yard Trail, which connects Braddock Road Metro Station to the planned Potomac Yard Metro Station, saw an increase in its morning and evening peak time bicycle volume. The volume of bikes on that trail was almost double what it was during the same period last year. The report also found that bicycle volume almost doubled on the Metro Linear Trail, a smaller, along-rail trail which connects the King Street and Braddock Road stations. (There were signs this might happen, like the owner of a local bike shop in Old Town telling WTOP that he’d been getting more inquiries about bike commuting in the weeks leading up to the shutdown.)
Most people are adding 30 minutes or more to their commute
Of the nearly 650 people that responded to the city’s online survey about the Platform Improvement Project, 60 percent said that they had experienced delays of a half hour or more each way. Another 43 percent said they experienced delays of less than 30 minutes each way. Either way, the shutdown has, expectedly, made commutes longer for many people in Alexandria.
There have been more than a million shuttle trips so far
More than half of the people who responded to Alexandria’s online survey indicated they had used the Blue or Yellow line shuttles, and the report puts a concrete number on how many riders have boarded the buses: 1,009,127 through July 14, with the two most popular routes being the Yellow Line local shuttle and the Franconia-Pentagon express. (Many of the riders represented by this number are probably repeat customers, because the figure counts the overall amount of trips.)
People have been taking the water taxi
In the lead up to the shutdown, Potomac Riverboat Company added additional service between Old Town and The Wharf, with Alexandria reimbursing some of commuters’ expenses. The taxi is now averaging 175 riders during the morning commute and 637 riders during the evening commute. Overall, the number of people taking the taxi has almost doubled since the first week of the shutdown. In Alexandria’s online survey, 6 percent of the respondents said they’d tried the water taxi.
